


beginnings

by emmyeccentric



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: F/M, Pregnancy, Season 3a, Smut, murderbaby, murderbaby ruined my life would be more accurate, murderpregnancy would be more accurate, this fic ruined my life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-05
Updated: 2015-08-05
Packaged: 2018-04-13 01:38:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4502820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmyeccentric/pseuds/emmyeccentric
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Children would keep her grounded; keep her humble, after living this blood-soaked melodrama."</p><p>or, a murderbaby!au of the entire first half of the third season</p>
            </blockquote>





	beginnings

**Author's Note:**

> WELL HERE IT IS FOLKS
> 
> i sold my soul to this fic and i still think it sucks

The night Anthony Dimmond’s blood stains their rug, she vomits more than once; oysters and Marsala be damned. Her vision swims with the violent aftershocks of Hannibal’s violent delights; as dizziness ends, the nausea begins, and vice-versa. This cycle of psychosomatic guilt lasts through the night and into the morning (the faint buzzing of an oscillating saw in tandem with continuous dull thuds from downstairs interrupt her attempts at slumber). Miserable, she injects 1.3 milligrams of lorazepam before heavy limbs drag her into slumber.

The drug serves its off-label purpose through the next day and several hours into the day after that. But the nausea returns with a vengeance and Hannibal finds her clutching the sides of their toilet, retching. He threads his fingers through her hair and pulls it from her face, offering her water when the spell passes.

“I’ll go to the physician tomorrow,” she sighs weakly, and he helps her to stand.

Blood is drawn for a white cell count to check for infection along with an order for a comprehensive metabolic panel to check organ function and she is inspected from head to toe.

“You’re underweight, Signora Fell,” the doctor mulls as he looks at her chart.

That’s to be expected, she thinks, with a diet comprised almost entirely of shellfish, Syrah, and IV stimulants. Her fingers dance briefly over her protruding ribs straining against blue faille silk.

“But the only reason I’m concerned about that,” he continues, Italian accent neglecting some of the consonants, “is because your hCG levels are at 215,000. Do you understand what that means, Signora?”

She’s pregnant. Seven weeks, at least. The nausea and missed cycles are easily explained now, although her original hypothesis of classic shock and rapid weight loss was much more comforting. Her throat feels heavy and rough.

“I suspect you’re at ten weeks, but I’m scheduling an immediate ultrasound to be sure. It’s uncommon, but certainly possible for a woman your age--- Congratulations, Signora.” Her heart becomes stone and she feels something like slow sand pump through her veins. “It’ll be a high risk pregnancy, you do understand.”

Bedelia knows her age is not the only risk factor. Her mind goes to the chemical cocktails she’s forced into her bloodstream over the recent years. She doesn’t know if she should feel guilty for jeopardizing the life growing inside her now, or feel guilty that her habits just weren’t enough to jeopardize its becoming--- what she would give for one those IV concoctions in this moment.

The Doctor sends her to the front desk and then she is ushered to the radiology center a floor down.

The screen shows a large black spot with not one, but two, bright crescent shapes occupying its center. “Gemelli,” the technician says brightly, overly so, and Bedelia smiles reflexively. Multiples are also common in later pregnancies, they assure her. She has another appointment scheduled in four weeks. She nods when she’s expected to, but not a word leaves her lips after seeing the ultrasound.

When Hannibal serves her oysters that evening, he places a soft kiss on her crown, then lifts his head and pauses for a moment. She realizes he’s processing, trying to decipher what the new notes mingling with her Guerlain could mean. She eyes her untouched her glass of wine, and is strongly debating downing the whole thing quickly and crudely. Hannibal suddenly kneels so he is at eye-level. He places his hand on hers and leaves a gentle kiss on her cheek. She notices his eyes flicker to her flat lower abdomen with wry delight. His mouth moves to her neck and she almost involuntarily leans into the touch, eyes fluttering closed.

“No more oysters, then,” he says into her skin and takes her plate. A stranger had once inadvertently told her that she was being fattened for slaughter. She briefly projects to her expanded form several months in the future; Hannibal may have yet succeeded.

He returns with vegetarian ratatouille and she gobbles it up with an unexpected fervor. The pregnancy isn’t mentioned again at the dinner table.

“How far along?” he eventually asks her later that evening in the den, his voice barely overpowering the crackling of the fire.

“Eight weeks.” The words catch in her throat like powerful whiskey.

The weight of a crucial detail leaves her tongue feeling dry and heavy. “Hannibal, it’s twins.”

His gaze fixes on the fire. “What do you intend to do?”

“For now, I only intend to think.” She rises from her seat elegantly as if the proverbial world hasn’t just been flipped upside-down. She heads to their bedroom, and makes good on her intentions.

It takes her only a few hours to decide that a baby, babies, are a better alibi than brainwashing, and even better still, a convoluted mixture of both elements. That a woman would be willing to have a child (children, she keeps forgetting the critical plurals) with the man who created her new identity out of several neurochemistry experiments--- it adds a whole new layer of horror that would evoke certain sympathies. Children would keep her grounded; keep her humble, after living this blood-soaked melodrama. It’s decided. Walking her fingers to her lower belly, she falls asleep smiling.

That very night, Will Graham appears in the Florentine catacombs. The indelible mark on Hannibal that had remained covered in the more recent weeks has returned like a neon sign made blinding and ostentatious by the night hours.

She may be the mother of his children, but a large part of her is still his therapist. And so they talk. They talk of love and betrayal, and Bedelia feels like a footnote in this grand plan of a life incognito, her children even more so. But nothing compares to the burden of the risk and exposure that has now been established. The lump in her throat and her shaking voice is unexpected, to say the least and unwelcome; to say the truth. In that moment, she accepts (with a tiny bit of grief) that her children will not have a father.

“I’m not concerned about me,” she forces herself into believing with assertion of voice and confident poise, “I know exactly how I will navigate out of exactly what it is I’ve gotten myself into...what I’ve gotten the three of us into.”

“So you’re keeping them, then.”

“Yes,” she tells him, but the thought of giving birth in a prison rattles her for a moment, “Where is Will Graham headed next?”

He tells her that he can never go home, and she wonders if their progeny will ever know the significance of the word.

* * *

 

The weeks pass quickly with no disruption in their individual routines. Her chemicals and medicines gather dust in their hiding place; her appetite returns with a vengeance. If her children are to be a part of her story, she needs to keep them healthy and content. Hannibal always obliges when she stops by the _pasticceria_ during their walks through the city. Surprisingly, He caters to her every craving; mostly salty, bold cheeses and sweets, or a strange combination of the two. Crepes become a provision in their household. One night she manages to scarf down a papaya-and-goat cheese Suzette, followed by a towering slice of Black Forest gateau. Hannibal chuckles as he dabs a chocolate shaving off her lips.

Sometimes, when she sees the red juices run off the sweetbreads and tartares he prepares so carefully, her mouth waters and her tongue prods at her cheeks, searching for a specific taste. She runs an aching tongue along her bottom lip, and reaches for a croissant instead. Those are the cravings she doesn’t indulge or mention.

Subsequently, her body begins to change. The new fullness of her face makes her look exceptionally youthful, and she often feels like she’s looking at a reflection twenty years gone. Her belly grows firm and curved, her hips flare. An ever-present flush blooms on her cheeks. Her nausea improves, except for the brief, more than infrequent moments she finds herself lusting over very rare cuts of meat. She looks at her profile in the mirror more than she ever thought she would.

He notices the difference; of course he does. Bedelia returns to the apartment one day to newly tailored suits and dresses that accommodate her expanding frame. The same portion of her clothes she piled together exasperatedly after too many zippers stopped on their way up. She’s one part grateful and four parts intrigued when it comes to these new gestures.

The pregnancy renders her insatiable in more ways than one. Bedelia feels like she’s devolved to an organism of lower phylogeny. She knows there’s nothing to abate the hormone-fueled reward centers in her brain shouting “ _foodsexfoodsexfoodsex_ ”, so every night concludes with chocolate between her lips or her clit between his. When they fuck, he’s either focused on her sensitive breasts or his thumbs stop to stroke her belly, stopping to give the area extra attention, kissing and nibbling gratuitously on the way down her body. He murmurs into her most sensitive skin about how much he thinks about touching her during the workday, about coming home and finding new shapes and curves, grasping suppler flesh, and discovering new ways to make her fall apart.

Hannibal ( _Roman_ , rather) joins her at the twelve-week appointment. When they listen to the heartbeats, echoing and melodic, Hannibal’s eyes flutter closed as they do when he listens to a powerful symphony. A transducer glides over the small, hardened mound of flesh that used to be toned and flat. The image is bright and promising, a confounding portrait--- the aftermath of their twisted endeavors. “Everything looks wonderful,” the Doctor tells her in his native tongue, “We will be able to determine sex next time,” he says in English now, brows raised and smile warm.

Professor Sogliato joins them that night at their dinner table, nursing his Punch Romaine, milking Hannibal’s patient reprieve while he can. Bedelia looks at the man concernedly, although the Professor does not know why. Culinary allusions to last meals are never a coincidence if you’re dining with the Devil.

She swallows her premonitions and realizes she desperately craves something cold, and her look is slightly pleading as she asks for a virgin substitute (which leaves her something resembling an Orange Sno-cone, the kind she took as a child).

“Your willpower is admirable, Signora,” Sogliato toasts, a bit too boldly.

“My wife is expecting.” There’s no build-up and he keeps his eyes on his pick and ice block as he makes their announcement. Bedelia feels her face heat and her jaw grow tight. Sogliato’s brows shoot up, the rest of his face hidden behind his glass.

“Well, that certainly is a surprise. Congratulazioni, indeed, Signora.” Beady eyes shoot suggestively over to Hannibal. “How lucky to have secured your position at the Palazzo, then, _Papa_.” His smile is oily, and Bedelia’s mouth goes dry. “The Studiolo is a small, fierce group. They have ruined many academic reputations.”

It simply takes another minute of conversation and a small toast until the ice-pick is jammed into the man’s temple “on impulse”, Hannibal claims. Bedelia fights both the urge to scream and to vomit. The antique, metallic smell of blood reaches her recently-heightened senses and she very nearly does get sick all over the silk damask. She can no longer tolerate the sputtering of the dying man, and takes out the weapon herself.

“Technically, you killed him.” Hannibal’s face adopts a unique adolescent arrogance that Bedelia is sure she will see again sixteen or seventeen years in the future.

“Two men from the Capponi are dead,” she asserts, clenched fists resting on the table. “You’re drawing them to you; all of them. Aren’t you?” She tries to relax her tightened muscles and fiddles with her wrist. “You have to at least attempt to restrain yourself from selfish pursuits.” Her hands encircle the tiny bump of her stomach, “Because it is no longer about yourself.” She brushes an errant hair from her face. “I must lie down,” she sighs, “this isn’t healthy.”

At the next dinner they host, Bedelia discovers the bewildering fact that her children are no longer privy knowledge. In the more recent weeks that August has shifted to September, coats have been able to conceal her tiny discretions, making them look more like too many helpings of mille-fuille than anything else. However, when she opens the door to the apartment Signora Albizzi’s eyes grow bright and she giggles out a “Mio Dio!” before Bedelia can greet her. The woman wraps one arm around her shoulder in a light embrace, and kisses her cheek. She’s stopped flinching when Hannibal’s colleagues come to visit; she’s almost acclimated to these new intimacies. “Doesn’t she look lovely, Edoardo?” Signor Albizzi smiles and nods sincerely. “I had no idea, Signora Fell! How long?”

“Thirteen weeks,” Bedelia murmurs, voice and smile subdued. The woman tries to hide her disbelief in a tight-lipped expression, as Bedelia takes her coat. “With twins.”

Signora Albizzi huffs out the breath she was holding, and clasps a hand to her chest. “Madonna, you are so small, _piccola_ ; I trust Doctor Fell is fulfilling your every whim?”

“Of course,” Hannibal announces as unexpectedly as he appears in the foyer, “Any animal must ensure that his offspring are the fittest. If that means frequent trips to the _gelateria_ , I will happily concede.” His words are sweet, overly so, leaving a cloying flavor in Bedelia’s mouth like overripe fruit. He wraps his arm around her shoulder; Bedelia feels something insidious brewing under her skin and Sogliato hasn’t even been bitten into yet.

Her unintentional quarry is served with semi-masturbatory grandeur, like every meal she shares with company these days. “I first made this dish in honor of my sister, when I was very young,” he says. Bedelia wonders if one of the children will look like Mischa, and she knows what Hannibal’s “honor” means. She shivers.

The sizzle and scent of the meat permeates the air. Glancing at her quinoa, greens, and glass of milk, she realizes it smells delicious; before remembering its source. It’s sickening, both watching everyone devour the man whose blood soiled her tablecloth and the abrupt, powerful yearning she has for a taste. Bedelia drinks her milk with restrained, mechanical hands. Everyone else thoroughly enjoys their meal. The sound of hungry people: silence, with the occasional ping of a fork against china gives her a migraine. The ringing and pulsing in her left temple continues through dinner and as soon as their guests are kindly ushered out into the Florentine night she drops into the nearest armchair.

“Are you well, Bedelia?”

“I’m fine,” she rasps hollowly, “Just a headache. Not an uncommon symptom.” She stands, and Hannibal’s thick arms encircle her from behind. His thumbs make small circles on her belly, and Bedelia’s neck cranes to meet him in a gentle kiss, lingering on his plump lower lip.

“Let me draw you a bath,” he hums.

He kisses her again, and goes to fill the large copper tub.

* * *

 

Bedelia knows he’s done this before, to the sister-daughter he lost. His hands haven’t lost their skill. The smell of jasmine and mint begins to weaken the knots of pain in her head and body, while his ministrations unravel them completely.

“I’ve been thinking about the babies,” she confesses, looking down at her stomach.

Sudsy hands never leave her hair; it’s become thicker and a little darker over the past three months. “I find myself thinking about them too; during the more relaxed hours at the Capponi.”

“I try to envision what they will look like, whose eyes they’ll have...what they’ll be like. What were you like as a young man?”

“I rooted for Mephistopheles and was contemptuous of Faust.”

“Our children will never know their families,” she murmurs, unbothered. The image of a cherub-cheeked Lithuanian baby girl with caramel-colored curls and dark brown eyes flashes in her mind. “Would you like to talk about your first spring lamb?”

“Would you?” he pokes her. Heat of anger flickers within her briefly.

“Why can’t you go home, Hannibal?” she pokes back, with a sharper weapon, “What happened to you there?”

Nothing surprising--- he happened. A maternal bitterness folds into her current range of emotion: Hannibal has denied her children something solid. He has denied them a foundation of family and connection. But then again, she denied herself that very thing when she agreed to hop on a plane, pistol and brandy in hand. Reflecting on these truths, she’s fuming.

“How did your sister taste?” The words feel like arsenic and lye on her lips but she does not regret them. She disappears into the water. When she resurfaces, he is gone. She glances around the room for the sake of her own safety and wraps a towel around her scrubbed-pink skin.

She sits at her vanity and hears the piano, knowing that his brooding will soon be over. It’s obvious that if she wasn’t carrying his children, he’d be downstairs picking out the china she would be served on. She applies rich honey-orange moisturizer delicately to her legs and arms, and moves on to the newest addition to her routine; a perfected mixture of lanolin and rose oil that she has been applying to her abdomen for a few weeks. She begins to untie her rose-gold robe, lost in the feel of the satin, and gasps when she sees Hannibal in the doorway.

“I hope they don’t resemble her,” he muses, eyes on the floor.

Bedelia unscrews the dropper from the vial of oil and drops some on her fingertips, admiring its sheen in the dim light of their room. “They’ll resemble us,” she sighs, terrified of what those words what might mean. She begins to rub circles where the arc of her belly reaches its peak.

“May I?” he asks, gesturing to the oil. She makes a soft, affirmative hum. Hannibal applies only a few drops to his hands and warms it. He cradles her stomach in his hands and begins to glide his hands of the expanse of her skin.

“My mother didn’t get stretch marks. My sister did. I’m playing a very cruel biological roulette.”

He huffs out a tiny chuckle, and focuses on her, as if he was handling a fragile, sacred artifact at the palazzo. Or preparing a gourmet marinade for some sort of poultry. She swallows the darker thought, before a strange sensation jolts her to the present. It’s a tiny popping within her, an effervescent burst of life. She presses her hand to the spot where she felt it.

“One of them just moved,” she says cautiously, “It was slight, but it was there.” She feels another soft pop and gasps softly. “They moved again.”

“Is this the first time?” Hannibal’s hands stop, and she nods.

“Keep going, I think it excites them.” He continues to apply her skin treatment with a little faster movement, and they do continue to move. He stops and looks up at her, his red-brown eyes soft and rich like the sanguinaccio he savors. “You referenced a ‘biological roulette’...I hope they look like you.” Her expression is one of gratitude, and it makes her eyes crinkle. It sounds so genuine that the beast seems almost human. She leans down and kisses him lightly.

It evolves quickly, tongues and tiny nips as his fragrant oiled hands travel up to her breasts. He plucks his mouth from hers and migrates to the sensitive pulse points on her neck. “You must tell me if you’re in pain,” emphasizing his disclaimer by applying a quick, gentle pressure to her right breast. He nibbles on her carotid and she whimpers quietly, but as his mouth continues its journey she knows she’s urged him on. His mouth moves over her darkened nipple that he laves with his tongue as delicately as he can, and her head falls back over the vanity chair. His hands coasts over the slope of her stomach as he moves to her left breast. He finds her her clit with practiced precision and she’s so sensitive now that her moan echoes off the walls. “Quiet, there are children present,” he quips, “Although the pregnancy is rather advantageous when it comes to---” His finishes his sentence by curling two fingers into her soaked cunt, and she bites her lips so powerfully she nearly breaks skin. He pumps into her, and her hips move in circles, aching for more friction. Her robe has slid off her shoulders, and he uses both hands to remove it completely. “Bed, Hannibal, the bed,” she manages.

As they cross to the other side of the room, she regains enough control over her body to unbutton his dress shirt, placing her mouth on every new bit of exposed skin. He gives her thicker hair a tug to coax her back to his mouth. He tosses the shirt over the chair as she works on his belt, but not before grabbing his cock straining against the wool. She strokes him and removes the rest of his clothing in one motion, then turns them (despite her small stature) so that Hannibal lands first. She’s ready for him, she has been ready for him, and straddles him urgently before lowering herself down onto him. Her center of gravity has begun to shift, and sex is different, but soon they establish a rhythm that has Bedelia punctuating each thrust with staccato moans. Her toes begin to curl within minutes, and pleasure begins to coil deep inside her. She finds her release quickly than she ever has, her mouth contorted in a silent scream as her hips move frantically. Her belly still glows from the oil and the sweat beginning to gather on her skin. The sight of herself, golden and ripening with new shapes and sensations has warm pleasure building up embarrassingly fast.

She comes three times before Hannibal groans out his own.

The babies’ fluttering lulls her to sleep.

* * *

 

Mischa’s death (or what she imagines it was) plays in her mind on a grainy and disturbing loop. As she and the babies grow, she can sense Hannibal feels the same way. She stopped praying long ago, but she’d be hiding from herself if she didn’t admit she has been begging some elusive higher power for two baby boys.

Mischa was eaten out of love and forgiveness, even though Hannibal did not fully understand those emotions at the time. He wants to forgive Will Graham, and so he craves his flesh. Past behavior is an indicator of future behavior. Fathers love their children. Fathers forgive their children for wrongdoings.

Abigail Hobbs’s body rots underneath the Chesapeake soil.

These precepts nearly horrify Bedelia to the point of tears as she looks down at the leather skirt stretched taut where she knows her children are safe--- for the next twenty-five weeks.

She continues to change; fortunately, Italy has many tailor shops and boutiques that can both accommodate her figure and the clothing she was accustomed to pre-pregnancy. She has taken to wearing Hannibal’s clothing to sleep in, something he claims to disapprove of, but more than once his hands have snaked up his own dress shirt to fondle her as he kisses the underside of her jaw. One day he presents to her three large boxes: one contains two nightgowns, one the color of the sea with pleating on the décolletage and another a deep eggplant with a tasteful amount of jacquard lace. The other packages contain several pairs of beautiful lingerie, of all shades and hues. He’s given her lingerie many times since their arrival in Europe, as a means of gratitude, flattery, and in some instances that concluded on a horizontal surface, self-indulgence.

However, these gifts are distinctive from the others. They are all made for nursing. She tilts her head and looks critically at the underwear, and then at the man who gave it to her. “I didn’t know if you were planning to breastfeed, but I thought you should be prepared. I can return them, if you wish.”

“No, no. I was planning to. It’s just,” she tries to find the proper phrase, “...much more personal than I would expect from you.”

“In regards to intimacy,” he places his hands on her stomach, “I think the gift you’ve given me surpasses anything fanciful like silk and lace.” Her nausea used to spike when he made these uncharacteristic sentiments. Recently, she’s been fighting the seemingly innate urge to trust them.

“Thank you. They’re all lovely.”

“And thank you.” He kisses her softly before she goes to bed.

The next morning he joins her again for her obstetrics appointment.

“Would like to know the sexes?” the sonographer asks before getting started.

“Yes, please,” Bedelia says, looking at Hannibal. The familiar chill of ultrasound gel and slight discomfort of the transducer comes next, before the sonographer starts taking measurements.

“Have they begun moving?” she asks. Bedelia nods, telling her just how active the two are. She continues to glide the transducer. “Papa should be able to feel in about two months.” The corner of his mouth draws up in a half-smile and he nods.

The babies twitch and drift carelessly on the screen before the woman studying it clicks her tongue. “Is there something concerning?” Hannibal jumps in and asks, much to Bedelia’s silent astonishment.

“No, Signor. It’s simply a matter of getting them to fix themselves in the proper position,” she palpates Bedelia’s abdomen with her free hand, “so we can determine the sex.” She continues to stare at the screen with narrowed eyes. “Ah, I have one of them,” she exclaims, “Baby A is definitely a boy.”

Bedelia exhales a breath she has been holding since she saw her children on the ultrasound display. “And,” the woman hesitates, “a beautiful little girl. One of each. Complimenti, Signor e Signora Fell.”

A little girl. Her heart stutters. Mischa, reincarnated. She never even gave serious consideration to that particular religious tenant before. She doesn’t mention this brief existential conflict to Hannibal.

She lies in the warmth of his arms that evening after somewhat of a carnal celebration in honor of their healthy children. Hannibal walks his fingers across the expanse of her stomach. “Simonetta, for the girl, after my mother.”

“It is beautiful,” Bedelia muses, “but I would prefer it as a middle name.” She adamantly refuses to name her daughter Abigail or Mischa. The very prospect could make her want to pack her bags and continue on the next American-bound flight. Luckily, Hannibal hasn’t suggested it yet. “I’ve always preferred the first name Vivienne, ever since I was a young woman. It was my grandmother’s name.”

“Vivienne Simonetta Lecter,” he tests the name on his tongue like wine, “It has a regality to it.”

“I’m pleased you think so,” she smirks, reminding herself that her unborn daughter’s name means ‘life’, despite her father’s twisted ideas of love.

“And for our son?” Hannibal murmurs into her hair.

“One name is enough for tonight. Mull it over, think of something truly sovereign,” immediately one of the babies kicks in protest, and she lets out a weak “oof”, reaching to soothe the spot gently. “Evidently, we must teach him patience. He’s impulsive, like his father.” Hannibal reclines his head and closes his eyes.

“You and I both know biology is a powerful determinant of personality,” he remarks. Indeed Bedelia knows; she’s looked up every scholarly article on Behavioral Genetics she could glean ever since she discovered she was expecting Il Monstro’s child. Don’t think about it, don’t think about it, you will be a good mother. The mantra has been repeating in her head ad nauseum for sixteen weeks. She simply turns down the allegorical volume when she wants to focus. Her mouth begins to go dry and her tongue feels heavy, partially due to her anxieties, but only partially.

“Hannibal?”, she fiddles with the hair on his chest, “The children want something salty.”

He twirls a platinum-blonde wave around a thick finger. “Would the children prefer Escargot or Roquefort?”

“Escargot, _s’il te plait_ ,” she answers softly but decisively, and Hannibal throws off the covers.

Early October has made the nights in Italy comfortable, spreading an Autumn-induced peace that settles over the city. Bedelia puts on her nightgown and robe and watches the lights of the Florence diffuse behind the gossamer curtains. Will Graham is somewhere underneath them planning Hannibal’s demise, and commutatively her own. Her teeth gnash behind pursed lips.

He returns with a beautiful spread of plump snails and some lemon water. She didn’t know about the cochlear gardens, nor did she know of Hannibal’s penchant for the firefly. “Fuel,” he tells her, “for transformation into a delicate creature of such beauty.” His eyes flicker down to her rounded stomach. “Lots of seasoning, lots of butter; fuel,” he repeats and offers her a skewered morsel. She takes it, although she does not want to be transformed, as much as he has tried. He’s already succeeded once, and now his final product hunts for them with vengeance pumping strongly through his veins. She considers she’s starting to glow in Hannibal’s eyes, and not just due to the pregnancy.

They discuss Will Graham once more and the two men’s antiquated intention to end the half-rivalry, half-affair in a lake of spilled blood. “Reciprocity”, he calls it.

“A shepherd dog doesn’t savage the sheep,” she says and she hopes on a painful level that that is truly the case with Will Graham as the babies begin to kick and flutter.

He wraps his arms around her, hands clasped together around her middle, as she pops another snail into her mouth. His breath is delicate and soft on her neck. “But it wants to,” Hannibal replies, suggesting that it is indeed not the case. His flippancy towards the dangerous metaphorical-canine in question leaves her flushed, with a hint of jealousy’s metallic resonance ringing in her ear. She wants to remind him of what’s at stake, and she will do it in the most archaic way she knows.

“Is that a suggestion?” she asks.

“Of course.” The fingers on her neck are replaced by his mouth, equally as gentle as his touch. He grabs another morsel and holds it to her lips. “Eat. You need it. _They_ need it.”

“Fuel,” she parrots, and seals her lips around the bite he’s offered, lightly kissing his fingers in the process. She swallows slowly and deliberately, before turning to the window. Hannibal continues his previous ministrations along her neck and collarbone.

She breathes, “If we keep track of incoming and outgoing intentions,” he doesn’t stop, and she feels heat pulse between her legs, “Will Graham is en route to kill you while you lie in wait to kill him. Now _that’s_ reciprocity.”

“How fortunate you should mention reciprocity,” he reaches over the slope of her belly to gently cup her breast, “because I believe we were starting a very powerful and pleasurable lesson on the subject.” She leans her lower body into his as he toys with her nipple. She bites her lip and feels herself throb, pondering if her condition would allow her to come from this sort of stimulus alone. Or maybe not.

“More,” she sighs, and he almost follows her demands, hands gliding along her hips, her belly, her thighs, her ass, but never reaching where she truly wants them.

“Take this off,” he murmurs, sliding off her robe and fingering the strap of the sea-colored gown, “I want to see you.” He kisses her hair and slides the loose straps down her shoulders, and she shrugs it into a puddle of satin around her feet. Hannibal wets his lips, like staring a particularly enticing meal.

She raises an eyebrow. “What is it?”

“The pregnancy does suit you, Dr. Du Maurier.” He drags his eyes down her figure.

“It’s evidence of your own virility,” she looks softly at her stomach and slides a hand down its shape, “It’s natural to be aroused.”

He grabs her hand and leads her back to their bedroom.

The door clicks, and his mouth is on her like a starving predator. Tongues twist, breath shortens. He slides a hand down to her soaked core, her thighs already slick with arousal, and slides two fingers in without warning. Her head falls against the door as her knees nearly give out, a deep, strong moan falling from her lips. His thick erection twitches against her. His thumb find her clit, eliciting another erotic noise. She sighs in loss as he removes his digits from her. “Go lie down on the edge of the bed, Bedelia.” He only calls her by her first name when he is in the throes of focus or determination. She lies down, and he follows, kneeling on the floor between her legs. He licks a long stripe down her pink flesh, and seals his lips around her clit. She’s already wound tight from his previous teasing, and her hips begin to move involuntarily. He throws an arm across her wider-but-gradually-disappearing pelvic bones to keep her still as he nips and sucks at the spots he knows avidly. She knows that Hannibal can tell she is close and her hips begin to twitch and her moans and breathy whines grow louder. Oh God, she’s going to---she huffs in agonizing frustration as he steps back. His pants are down in an instant, and he heaves her legs over his shoulder as he fucks her hard and deeply.

He fringe flops in his face; she closes her eyes and finds her own clit with her own hand. This won’t be long, she thinks; she flutters her eyes open briefly to see his eyes glued to her swollen breasts bouncing with his movements. Hannibal pushes her hand away, and rubs her fervently. Her nerves are pulled taut, starting from toes and radiating outwards, and then snapped back as she rides out her orgasm, her face contorted in bliss. Hannibal follows, sucking in his lower lip as he thrusts once, twice, three times into her.

As their breathing grows even, she scoots so he that he can lay beside her. The room is silent in their afterglow and he runs his finger through her hair before she stirs in his arms. She sits up, and tucks her hair behind her ear. “I’m peckish.”

“Glad to hear it,” he smiles, leaving a hand on the babies. Unashamed, she walks back to their living room completely nude.

* * *

 

It’s two months before a Signor Renaldo Pazzi comes to call at her door, asking probing questions about her husband. When the inspector sees her belly convex with twenty-four weeks worth of growth, shock fires behind his eyes and quickly recoils. She can see that Pazzi knows the two babies she’s carrying are going to prove to be a huge obstacle.

“Signora Fell,” he points to her, “you are expecting?”

The question is so banally obvious she nearly laughs. “It would appear so. Twins, and not too much longer.”

“I see. I just have a few questions about your husband.”

“May I ask why?” she says, lowering herself into an armchair.

“Two men are missing from the Capponi. We are just doing some housekeeping to make sure there’s no foul play.” He’s lying, she can tell by the thickness of his voice.

The interview isn’t very intrusive, simply questions if he knew this person or that person, the frame of time she and “Roman” have been in Florence.

“Good day, Inspector Pazzi,” she says calmly, seeing him to the door. Her voice does not betray her heart, which has been beating twice its normal speed since he knocked on her door.

After dinner that night, she pads around their lounge to soothe her aching back while Hannibal plays the piano, expressing his desires for a harpsichord instead. She stands besides the piano as he finishes the piece with fortissimo, and the babies jump at the bold notes. She takes a short deep breath, and Hannibal’s eyes grow urgent. “You only startled them. They jumped.” He nods and expresses the fact, previously unbeknownst to Bedelia, that Pazzi knows the very nature of the monster that just so happened to father her children.

The Inspector has a long and complex plan for Hannibal’s demise, ending with the simplest conclusion: cash. She begins to seethe. She goes to sit with him on the piano bench. A weak look of amusement flickers across her face when he has to scoot the bench back so she can fit between the seat and the piano.

“What is worth to be the man who caught Hannibal Lecter?” She directs the question at herself, more than she does to Hannibal.

“For a policeman, credit has a short half-life. Better to sell me.” Her chest drops, and in that moment she knows exactly what she has to do. And it’s exactly what she predicted.

He plays softly and she listens with a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. “We need to think of a name for the boy,” The babies sway softly to the concerto their father plays, “I was considering Theodore after my father--- Theo.” The music fades gently, and Hannibal reaches out, waiting to feel his children kick beneath his palm.

“Vivienne and Theo,” he’s not cooing, nor would he, but he is also not talking to Bedelia, “How do you see to that?” He tears his eyes from her belly and leans to kiss her hungrily. Bedelia’s eyes close and her hands land on the piano keys for purchase and the jarring notes make the babies leap again.

“Oh,” she says sharply into Hannibal’s mouth before pulling away, “they have a strong aversion to discordance.” She ghosts her lips over his neck, “Like father like twins.” A gentle hand on her neck urges her up to his lips and her tongue reaches out to taste the roof of his mouth. She moves to nibble at his earlobe, but the pain in her back from the hard, backless piano bench stops her. “May we take these diversions somewhere more accommodating for a woman of my current rotundity?” He laughs loudly at that, a rumbling, mirthful sound. He helps her off the piano bench, and proceeds to make her come with his fingers, his mouth, and his cock; more than once. Afterwards, he kneads and softens the lingering pain in her swollen feet and aching back--- as he sleeps, she clandestinely packs a bag.

* * *

 

It’s a game of waiting after that. Waiting for Pazzi to die, waiting for Will Graham to appear. Over that fortnight, heavy with tenuous anticipation, she uses sex when she needs to escape. He can’t curve around her belly now, so he usually grasps her hips and thrust into her from behind. She feels so fortunate she no longer has to look at the painful reminder of his face.

The twins finally make their presence known to their father, and not a moment too soon. Bedelia and Hannibal find themselves laying in bed watching the expanse of her stomach ebb and flow with the children’s movements. Hannibal gently rubs his thumb over the protrusion of a heel or fist poking out from underneath the surface of her taut skin.

One Saturday, they spend the majority of the day in bed; they both know their time is limited. Hannibal leaves late that night to finish some work at the Capponi. That’s the night Pazzi dies. Hannibal nearly does as well.

Arriving home in the early morning, he’s extremely battered and bruised. She hasn’t sewn stitches or nursed wounds in a solid decade, and her bedside manner is further impeded by uncomfortably crouching over the copper tub as much as her body can allow.

The air in the apartment is both heavy and hollow, like the dead weight of a desiccated corpse. She lets him rest and sketch his last glimpses of Florence before she shows him the packed valise.

“Florence is where I became I man,” he says mournfully, “And a father. I see my end in their beginning.”

“All of our ends can be found in beginnings,” she packs his sketches, “History repeats itself, and we cannot escape.” The cyclical nature of time was never so clear to her pre-pregnancy, but it was hard to ignore as its very proof grew within her.

This is where he leaves her. This is where her work begins, as his opus draws to its climax. Endings and beginnings.

“I imagined this differently,” he muses, “especially with the children.”

“I didn’t,” she pauses, “especially with the children. I knew you intended to eat me, and I knew that you had no intention of eating me hastily. But your plan crumbled, did it not? And now _Il Monstro_ is contending against temptation, for the sake of his children.” She places both hands on her belly. “Have we marinated long enough for your tastes?” Hannibal swallows thickly, chastised. “When they come, what will you say of me?”

Bedelia finds it egregious how much her and her children’s future depends on the flimsy answer of a pure sociopath. “I will help you tell the version of events you want to be told. I will help you because you asked me to, and because there are two people I find myself inexplicably obliged to.”

“You may make a meal of us yet,” she gets close enough to feel his breath on her lips, “but not today--- not before you make one out of yourself. Goodbye, Hannibal.” She grabs his hands and places them on either side of her stomach as leaves a lingering, taunting kiss on his lips. The babies grant their father the privilege of feeling them move one last time. The door closes behind him, and the busy hum of the city disappears with him.

She quickly goes to withdraw her previous hobbies from their temporary home, making sure to dishevel the vials and leave the syringe carelessly on the vanity. The familiar sound of tightened latex creaks around her skin as she withdraws two small vials from her kit: fentanyl and morphine. In very small doses, these narcotics are entirely safe for pregnancy, and they’re frequently used in Cesarean sections. She bites her lip and pushes the plunger down with a gentle and familiar touch.

The high is pleasant, albeit not as engulfing as the ones she had before. More importantly, the babies are tossing and turning as they often do. Her head drifts to the back of her seat and she closes her eyes. Then she hears light, urgent steps.

“You must be looking for Hannibal Lecter,” she tells the lovely woman wielding her semi-automatic, “One of his patients?”

“No, not a patient. Where is he?” The guest is quiet.

Bedelia turns in her chair and reveals her middle. “Seeing as you let yourself in, forgive me if it’s forward of me to ask, but who the hell are you?”

“Family,” her eyes narrow and look away from Bedelia’s stomach when she supports her back to lift herself out of her chair.

“And you’ve come all the way from home.”

“It looks like you are family too,” the stranger challenges.

“I’m his psychiatrist,” Bedelia answers, seeing the woman’s eyes drag across her form, “They’re his.”

“You’re his little birds,” she says smugly, “He puts us in cages to see what we’ll do. You haven’t flown away.”

“And you’re flying right towards him. How does he inspire such devotion?”

“ _You’re_ his _psychiatrist_ ,” she baits.

“Were you there? Did you watch as the beast within him turned from the teat and entered the world?”

The woman looks down at Bedelia’s stomach between them. “Will you?” The words hit Bedelia like ice-water flooding over her.

“What do you want?”

“I want to cage him,” the guest’s voice is light and her intentions clear.

“I thought Will Graham was Hannibal’s biggest mistake,” Will Graham’s name tastes like quinine on Bedelia’s tongue, “I wonder if it isn’t you. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to rest.” She hears her leave and Bedelia sinks into the nearest lounge chair. Despite the minute dose, her high is stronger now and she’s very nearly rolling; her feet and back no longer ache but it’s been a while since the babies moved. “Wake up,” she whispers, her words slurred, pressing insistently on her stomach. She’s rewarded with a foot tangling in her ribs and it’s all the comfort she needs.

A knock on the door pulls her out of her contentment.

The faces of Will Graham and Jack Crawford are slightly warped but are no doubt theirs. Only her profile is visible through the gap in the door.

“Mrs. Fell, I presume?” The proud smile on his face is unbearable, so she opens the door fully. The pregnancy has been unmistakable for months now but the pine-green dress she wears wraps around every curve and tastefully molds to her belly, and puts her improved cleavage on display. That’s why she chose it this morning.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Jack nearly stammers, while Will Graham lets out a tired chuckle, despite the grimace he dons.

Bedelia smirks. “Come in, gentlemen.” She settles deeply in the lounge chair once more and puts her feet on its ottoman. “How can I help you?”

Jack must hear the intoxicated smudge in her voice. “Are you _drunk_ right now?”

Her cat-like smile fades and then returns. “My husband is a doctor. He’s been treating my condition. The treatment has changed since I became pregnant, of course.”

“And what condition is that Mrs. Fell?” he bites.

“I get confused. He assures me it’s all safe for the children,” she’s preening, basking in the warmth of her eventual success.

“Oh please,” Will snorts, “Get over yourself, whatever self that is, Bedelia.”

“You must have the wrong woman. My name is Lydia Fell.” Her speech patterns are normal now, and the babies are tumbling carelessly. Good.

Jack laughs as Will Graham turns to her. “You expect us to believe you somehow lost yourself in the hot darkness of Hannibal Lecter’s mind?”

She strokes a hand up and down her distended abdomen. “Looking at me, as I am now, is it truly that hard to believe?”

Jack shoves a screen in her face that shows her “Missing Persons” information. “That’s you, isn’t it?”

She sighs in mock-frustration. “Well now I’m really confused.” They don’t believe her, but she tingles with the fact the case against her is nearly nill. It doesn’t matter if they believe her. Jack Crawford and Will Graham’s influence is completely eclipsed by the influence of her unborn children.

Will Graham tinkers with the vials, listing them by name.

“You were shooting up the same cocktail he served Miriam Lass,” Jack notes.

“What have you been using now, Mom?” Will Graham picks up the opened vials. “Let’s see here, fentanyl and a few drops of morphine. Good for babies, right?”

“You were freebasing your alibi. And then you _concieved_ one,” Jack looks out the window.

She interrupts him with two heavy fingers. "Two. Twins."

Jack shakes his head in disbelief, covering his eyes. “And I’m not even mad at you. A little disturbed, maybe, but to tell you the truth, I’m fairly impressed.”

“But at least now we know how you’ve managed to stay alive,” Will Graham points at her middle.

The surprise interrogation goes into the mystery of the absent polizia and the Questura and their greed for Hannibal Lecter's living hide. They’ve been waiting like hawks in the night, waiting for Hannibal to scurry into their line of vision. Will Graham gives up his prodding, and slips out the door silently.

“Interest in my husband is certainly growing competitive. I wonder who will catch him first," she hums, "Who will leave these children without their father?”

Later that night, the “who” in question turns out to be Bedelia herself when she turns him over to the money-hungry Questura.

The babies flail and punch in protest, and she almost feels scolded. She begins to sob into her hands only seconds after the last polizia rushes out of the apartment. It’s the first time she’s cried since her attack so long ago.

* * *

 

Vivienne Simonetta Du Maurier and Theodore Robert Du Maurier are born nine weeks later in a private hospital in Fairfax, Virginia. They are deemed pink, perfect, and beautiful.

The Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane grants Hannibal the privilege to see his children on their birthday via webcam. Bedelia sits in front of her respective screen, her platinum hair blending with the stark white of the hospital’s sheets. She’s red and exhausted but astoundingly happy. One child in blue suckles greedily at her breast before she gently turns him to face his father. “May I introduce you to your children, Hannibal?” she says, bubbly and bright, looking completely enamored with the two of them. She’s dangling them in front of him, shows him the beginning of a life he will never have. The girl has Bedelia’s almond eyes and her tapered chin, perfectly complemented by his nose. She doesn’t look much like Mischa. However, his son is like a shrunken mirror image of his own visage. A tear escapes and rolls down his face.

As the babies sleep in their shared hospital bassinet, Bedelia begins typing the manuscript for her tell-all, told the way she chooses; as long as Hannibal keeps his promise to come to her aid given she need it.

Three years later, when the public have engorged themselves on false scandals and horrific drama, she finds herself required to attend book signings. It pays well.

Bedelia’s fans are nearly always fascinated by the beautiful girl and boy with dark blond hair and sharp cheekbones, doodling in coloring books beside her.

But she can’t ignore the fear in their eyes, and the way they stare at her children like psychopathic bombs waiting for something to destroy.

Their father sends letters she reads to them aloud along with the occasional gift. In his correspondences, he always expresses how much he cares for his son and daughter, even though they can’t see him. The twins seldom ask about their father without some suggestion and probing, and their faces grow blank when he is mentioned. Bedelia thinks Vivy and Theo already may understand the extent of his crimes by some sort of mystical means even before they can read his letters on their own.

The letters always begin and end the same: “ _To My Little Birds_ ”....” _With so much love, Papa_.”

 


End file.
